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10 Foods You Didn’t Know Were Processed

Mike Sowden — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 00:34:07 +0000

In the wake of Unprocessed October, you may have developed a taste for more simply-prepared fare. Problem is, you can’t trust your senses. Think that rolled oats are as untouched as food gets? Think again – and check out the rest of this list of 10 surprisingly processed foods!

1. Oats. Ever tried to squash a groat? It’s an eye-opener into the effort required to roll an oat flat (above left). But that’s not all: the average rolled oat has also been steamed and lightly toasted. If you’re going for the steel-cut variety (above right), you’ll skip the rolling and enjoy extra bran in your diet, but they’re still steamed and then dried to keep them fresh.

2. Dried Pasta. Flour and eggs, mixed and squeezed into a variety of shapes. Sounds a simple process…until you look past the pasta and at the flour it’s made of. Industrial flour-making? Next time you have a few days spare, have a look at all the processing involved, especially when preservatives enter the mix.

3. Ice Cream. Ever fought to run your scoop through a tub of ice-cream fresh from the freezer? If the answer is “I only buy the soft stuff”, you’ll have stabilizers to thank. These compounds (usually polysaccharide gums) stop ice cream hardening and also separating into gritty ice-crystals. And let’s not forget emulsifiers, there to make your ice-cream smooth and whippy.

4. Olive oil. The first sight of an untreated, unprocessed olive can be a shock. This tiny green bullet is an olive? Imagine the energy expended in grinding it into paste, spread out and pressed until the oil squeezes out – at which point this oil is further processed to get the excess water out. (You’re allowed to feel a new respect for ancient farmers here).

5. Tofu. Take a handful of soya beans, compress them – get tofu? Sadly no. You need to coagulate soy milk, and that requires coagulants – gypsum, calcium chloride, or a host of other chemicals used in the process. Then comes the straining and pressing. Lots and lots of it. The firmer the raw tofu, the more processing it’s had.

6. Low Fat or No-fat Milk. In the old days, making low fat milk was as straightforward as skimming of the top layer to remove the cream, leaving the rest of the mix fat-depleted – but now they use centrifugal separators. Those health benefits come with an energy cost. Oh, and since no-fat milk feels watery in the mouth, dairies pop a little of the milk solids back in at the end. Yes, the cream.

7. Corn tortillas. Corn? Flour – and all the processing and additives that entails. Unless you aim for a masa that was made from maiz blanco (field corn) – and even then it can be a lengthy process to go from masa to tortilla.

8. Cheese. What a marvel cheese is. Leave milk until it forms curds and whey, add a lactic starter and watch as it lumps together into cheesy goodness. Well – kinda. That’s cottage cheese, the simplest form. Commercial cheesemaking requires all sorts of enzyme coagulants, bacteria (eg. penicillin for “blue” cheese), washing, pressing, ripening, and all those special ingredients that make each cheese distinct. There’s an awful lot to it all.

9. Bread. Domestic breadmaking is deliciously good fun, making your entire house smell like your local bakery and providing you with bread that tastes like bread. Go on, you know you want to. But if you insist on the commercial variety, know that the processes involves are many. “Quick breads” (those cheaper loaves at the supermarket) are chemically hurried along the leavening cycle, while yeast breads can still be stuffed with bread improvers.

10. Herbal Teas. Alas that our modern tastes demand that commercially-produced herbal teas – by their very nature bitter (but invigorating) brews – need a little adjustment before they hits our palates. Artificial flavors ahoy. Check the label carefully!

Images: little blue hen, FotoosVanRobin, St0rmz, Taras Kalapun, avlkyz, R’eyes, lucianvenutian, Karl Palutke, Emily Carlin, blgrssby

10 Foods You Didn’t Know Were Processed

Mike Sowden — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 19:45:35 +0000

Images: little blue hen, FotoosVanRobin, St0rmz, Taras Kalapun, avlkyz, R’eyes, lucianvenutian, Karl Palutke, Emily Carlin, blgrssby

It’s Unprocessed October: What’s in Your Cupboard?

Vanessa Barrington — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 20:00:03 +0000

Every month it seems that there’s a different blog-driven food challenge. This month, it’s Unprocessed October. Just like the challenge of defining local for September’s Eat Local Challenge, one of the challenges (besides restricting your diet) is defining unprocessed.

Whole, single ingredient foods like fresh fruits and vegetables are obviously unprocessed. Eggs are a pretty clear-cut unprocessed food. As are meats that haven’t been smoked or cured in any way. The tomatoes in the photo above – though technically “processed” to can them safely – would be unprocessed in my book, because they are sold by a vendor I know, at a reputable farmers’ market, and don’t contain anything but whole ingredients. (Extra points if you canned your own tomatoes!) But once you venture outside of those parameters, it gets a little trickier to define “processed food.”

For example, what about grains and flour? Are steel cut oats processed? What about rolled oats? Probably not, because the outer hull is removed. Let’s say you decide that flour is unprocessed as long as it’s ground from whole grains, and butter is okay because you could certainly make it at home with fresh cream”¦

So you set out to make a fabulous dessert with fresh fruit, flour, butter, and eggs. But if you put sugar in it, you’re on shakier ground because both white and brown sugar are highly processed and sometimes bleached with chemicals. You might decide to use honey, or maple syrup, or even turbinado sugar, but for some people those foods might be considered processed.

As another example, what about dairy products? Is pasteurization considered processing? What if you remove some of their fat? Or take those dairy products and make them into cheese, or yogurt?

And what about the other stuff in the bulk bins at the supermarket besides the whole grains? Dried fruit, for instance. Or trail mix? Depends on what’s in it. If dried fruit has sulfur added to it to keep it soft and brightly colored, you might want to take a pass, while unsulphured fruit might be ok.

The trouble with defining processing is that humans have been processing foods forever. Originally, the purpose of processing was to enhance the food’s flavor, nutrition, longevity, or all three. Long ago humans figured out how to turn milk into cheese and other dairy products, grind whole grains into flour, or ferment them to make alcoholic beverages, preserve vegetables through pickling or fermentation, and smoke or dry meats to make them last until the next hunt.

But modern, industrial processing of food is a different story. This type of processing may be done to enhance shelf life but rarely does it enhance the actual food or its health-giving properties. (Don’t get me started on so-called “functional foods.”) It’s these modern processed foods we want to stay away from during Unprocessed October.

But even with those seemingly whole foods, there’s some gray area. For example, would you consider an energy bar processed? It depends on the method and ingredients. One helpful blog resource, Gastronicity, written by Nishanga Bliss L.A.c. says that a Clif Bar would definitely be processed while an 18 Rabbits Granola bar would not, due to its short list of real ingredients. Andrew Wilder’s blog, Eating Rules (where Unprocessed October originated) holds every food up to the DIY test before making the call.

According to Eating Rules, if the food is something you could conceivably make at home, even if it requires specialized equipment, it’s okay. Therefore cheese is fine, beer is all right, cooking oils, and even distilled alcoholic beverages get a passing grade. Likewise coffee and chocolate. These are eating rules I could live with.

But the Eating Rules blog also cautions readers to check labels. If the chocolate has emulsifiers, consider it processed. If the grains are refined, better skip them. There are a number of other cautionary ingredients. Yogurt is another good example. Yogurt at its simplest is easy to make at home by simply heating milk, adding some starter yogurt and then keeping the mixture at the proper temperature until it cultures and thickens. But store-bought yogurt can contain high fructose corn syrup and other added ingredients that would certainly make it processed. Nishanga Bliss of Gastronicity told me that Yoplait lemon yogurt has more sugar and more ingredients than HÃ¤agen Dazs chocolate ice cream. Read the labels!

I can’t decide for you what to consider processed or not, but for my own unprocessed October pantry, I’d say that if the food product specialized mechanical equipment or a temperature controlled room, it’s processed.

If you want to participate in Unprocessed October, don’t worry that we’re well into the month. Start with a week and extend your month into November if you’re having too much fun to stop!

There is a sea of packaged foods on a typical grocer’s shelf that you can tell at a glance are processed, but here’s a list of 10 foods to watch out for that you might normally consider whole, healthy foods.

1. Almost any type of commercial cereal, including rolled oats – because they are not made from whole grains, and are produced through a laborious process requiring special rollers and driers

2. Dried Pasta – unless you know the flour used to make it was made with whole grains

3. Ice Cream – commercial brands contain undisclosed stabilizers to keep it soft in your freezer

4. Olive oil and nut oils – laborious process for a home cook, so use butter or home-rendered lard

5. Tofu – unless you make it at home using whole organic soybeans and not commercial soy milk

6. Low Fat or Non fat dairy products – usually have processed milk solids added back into them to preserve mouth feel

7. Corn tortillas – unless you know that they were made from masa that was prepared from field corn, and don’t contain additives to keep them soft. (Store bought flour tortillas are definitely out.)

8. Many commercial cheeses and yogurts – check the labels for unfamiliar ingredients

9. Almost any commercial bread – yup! Even the ones that say “whole wheat” Read the labels!

10. Herbal Teas – some brands (even natural ones) add artificial flavors

This is the latest installment in Vanessa Barrington’s weekly column, The Green Plate, on the environmental, social, and political issues related to what and how we eat.

Image: Vanessa Barrington

The 10 Least Green Government Subsidies

Stephanie Rogers — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 22:31:23 +0000

Urban sprawl, pollution, over-consumption, deforestation…like it or not, U.S. taxpayers are still paying for all of these things to occur in America and beyond. Despite recent investments in green jobs and technology, an array of government subsidies pay big dirty industries like oil, coal and factory farms to destroy the environment in every way possible while greener, healthier industries like solar power and vegetable farms get a pittance.

1. Highways

When gas prices rose dramatically in 2008, Americans began flocking to mass transit in droves, resulting in declining revenues for the Federal Highway Trust Fund. Naturally, the Bush Administration’s response was to take money from already underfunded mass transit and use it to pay for highways that are already, as Slate put it, “paved with gold”. Billions of dollars are pumped into the highway system every year, which encourages the polluting car culture and leads to further sprawl, while mass transit continues to fall by the wayside.

2. SUVs

In case you aren’t already taking optimal advantage of the polluting power of our nation’s sprawling web of highways, the government would like to make your impact even greater by setting you up in a nice gas-guzzling subsidized SUV. A portion of the tax code revised in 2003 gives business owners a huge deduction for up to 30% of a large vehicle’s cost, which can add up to $25,000 in the case of a Hummer – far more than the credit given to individual purchasers of energy-efficient vehicles. Attempts to axe this provision in 2007 failed.

You only get the credit if it seats more than 9 passengers or weighs more than 14,000 pounds, but they don’t really care whether your business actually requires such a vehicle. So, by all means, get the Escalade.

3. Paper Mills

Paper mills cut down trees while sucking up massive amounts of fossil fuels and get big money from the government to do it – all through a loophole in a law that was supposed to benefit renewable energy. A law enacted in 2005 contains a section that gives businesses an incentive to mix alternative energy sources with fossil fuels. To qualify for the tax credit, paper companies started adding diesel fuel to “black liquor”, a pulp-making byproduct that they were already using to generate electricity on its own.

But time might be running out for this egregious misuse of taxpayer money: the unemployment extension bill approved by the Senate and on its way to the House would eliminate this loophole and use the funds for health care. (Editor’s note: We’ve contacted both the editor and writer of this story at BusinessWeek to confirm that this loophole will still be closed in the bill just passed by the Senate, and will update if more information becomes available. In the meantime, there’s this resource which seems to confirm the loophole is in fact being closed.)

4. Commercial Fishing

About half of the $713 million in subsidies given to the U.S. fishing industry directly contributes to overfishing, according to a new study by the Environmental Working Group. The subsidies – which equal about a fifth of the value of the catch itself – lower overhead costs and promote increased fishing capacity, meaning more fish are caught than can be naturally replaced.

Overfishing is a huge environmental problem – up to 25% of the world’s fishery stocks are overexploited or depleted, according to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization. But that’s not the only result of the subsidies; because roughly half of the money goes toward fuel costs, other consequences include wasteful fuel consumption as well as air and water pollution.

5. Nuclear Power

The nuclear industry’s decade-long, $600 million lobbying effort finally paid off as President Obama agreed to grant loan guarantees for nuclear power plants. Obama has been promising since the early days of his campaign that he would find a way to “safely harness nuclear power”, but the $55 billion taxpayer-backed loan guarantees are going forward despite continued reservations about uranium mining and the storage of radioactive waste.

6. Factory Farming

American factory farms are literally filthy cesspools of their own making, and who else is cleaning up all that shit but American taxpayers? Giant factory farms make up just 2% of the livestock farms in the U.S. yet raise 40% of all animals in the U.S., and they do it using practices that are not only harmful to workers and the animals themselves, but to the environment.

The government heavily subsidizes factory farms so they can provide Ã¼ber-cheap meat and dairy, raising as many animals as possible in the shortest amount of time with the least amount of care. And why should they care about finding better ways to manage manure when the government hands them $125 million annually to “deal” with the consequences, and then doesn’t bother to check up on them?

Despite the backwards funding given to clean them up, gaping lagoons of livestock waste packed with pollutants continue to be one of the biggest environmental problems in America, fouling our water and causing those depressing dead zones in our oceans.

7. Corn Ethanol

In the quest to beat back fossil fuels, cleaner fuels that we can grow seemed like a good idea – until we realized that some, like corn, make a huge dent in the world’s food supply. But that isn’t stopping the U.S. government from giving billions in subsidies to the corn industry in general, and corn ethanol in particular.

Corn-based ethanol gobbled up 76% of federal government renewable energy subsidies in 2007, leaving little for more environmentally sound renewable energy sources like wind and solar. Worse yet, it’s a huge drain on water resources, gulping down up to 2,138 liters of water per liter of ethanol.

This isn’t just an unwise investment – it’s also destroying the rainforest. As American farmers have abandoned soy for subsidized corn, soy prices have risen worldwide – and led to an increase in Amazon deforestation. Brazil is the world’s second-largest producer of soy next to the U.S., and growing demand has meant more clear-cutting for soy plantations.

8. Processed Foods

Ethanol isn’t the only product that comes to us courtesy of U.S. corn subsidies. There’s also plenty of craptastic processed “food” products packed with multiple subsidized ingredients: wheat, sugar, soy and of course, corn. Gee, could the obesity epidemic have anything to do with the fact that our government makes junk food cheap, and encourages its consumption through the food stamp program?

It’s a sad state of affairs when a Twinkie costs less, calorically speaking, than a carrot. Meanwhile, farmers who produce fruits and vegetables (aside from corn), don’t get a dime in government subsidies. While the government is considering junk food taxes, a change to the Farm Bill might be more efficient.

9. Coal

You would think that the coal industry’s long-held dominance of the American energy market would have eliminated the need for subsidies. After all, the industry spent $47 million last year on PR alone. But the fact is, coal companies are milking the government for all it’s worth while continuing to pump greenhouse gases and carcinogens into the air and turn the Appalachian Mountains into post-apocalyptic hellholes.

Coal subsidies have survived this long because of the industry’s staggering influence on lawmakers, and because constituents in coal states often fear the economic repercussions of a scaled-back coal industry more than they fear the harm to their health and homes. And on top of the federal coal subsidies lumped in under “˜fossil fuels’, the industry gets untold breaks on a state and local level in places like Kentucky, where the coal industry netted $115 million in subsidies in 2006.

10. Oil

Climate change: brought to you by the U.S. government! According to a study by the Environmental Law Institute, fossil fuels received over $70 billion in subsidies between 2002 and 2008, while traditional sources of renewable energy were given just $12.2 billion.

But the oil industry won’t even admit that the direct spending and tax breaks they get are subsidies – they prefer to call them “incentives”, and claim that attempts to roll back some of those subsidies are actually “new taxes”.

As Grist notes, the ELI report is actually pretty conservative – it didn’t include things like military spending to defend oil in the Middle East or infrastructure spending. But the fossil fuel industry’s free ride is almost over: President Obama’s new federal budget proposal wipes out these breaks and increases funding for clean energy research (and, unfortunately, nuclear power).

Photo credits: The following photos are from Flickr and licensed for commercial use under Creative Commons: “Freeway” by Payton Chung; ”SUV” by The Car Spy; ”Paper mill in Washington State” by Jan Tik; ”Fish face” by Andy Welsh; ”Nuclear reactor” by Intamin10; ”Factory farm protest sign” by johnnyalive; ”Corn” by normanack; ”Coal” by Duncan Harris; ”Oil rig” by kenhodge13.

Bye Bye, Bleached: Healthier Cooking with Unbleached Flour

Heather Brubaker — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 21:00:52 +0000

As soon as I learned that I could buy unbleached flour, I stopped buying bleached. Why would anyone want to bleach flour anyway? The word “bleach” used in association with food alone just intuitively seemed wrong. Then the other day a friend of mine asked me the difference, and I realized I couldn’t exactly say.

Clearly, I’m not an avid baker. (I mostly fall into the savory camp.) Any dedicated baker knows that different flours produce different results in baking. The methods used in processing (and the types of wheat used) affect the chemical and structural properties of the flour, which in turn affect the volume and texture of whatever you’re baking.

In a nutshell? Bleached flour works better for cakes, pancakes, waffles, cookies and pie crust. Unbleached flour works best for yeast breads, cream puffs and popovers. For a foodie or passionate cook looking to bake cake with the perfect texture and crumb, bleached flour (also cake flour which is bleached) could be imperative.

How exactly does flour get bleached, I wondered? Apparently, it’s gassed with chlorine oxide during processing. Egads! That’s an appetite buzz-kill! Yet, after doing a bit more research, it seems there aren’t any conclusive studies that prove that eating bleached flour is actually harmful or at least not in the quantities that can be reasonably consumed by any human being.

Still, science has its limits. And most of us know that wheat bread is healthier than white bread, for example, as the nutrients in flour are mostly removed through the refining process to make bleached flour. As the old, Italian saying goes, “the whiter the bread, the sooner you’ll be dead.” Anyone focused on a healthy lifestyle knows to avoid as much processed food as possible.

Yet I have a feeling that if you’re planning on baking a cake, health may not be first and foremost on your mind.

Image: isabel*la

The Verdict Is in: We’re Salt-aholics

Heather Brubaker — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 18:26:17 +0000

Americans are eating 50 percent more salt than they were in the 1970s, and eating too much salt is related to heart disease. The culprit? Yet again, processed food.

First it was trans-fats and now it’s salt. I mentioned the need to retrain your palette to keep from craving junk food in the Junk Food Jones. Turns out we all need to retrain our palettes to enjoy food with less salt.

The amount of salt contained in processed food has gradually increased over time and our palettes have adjusted accordingly. Apparently, three quarters of the salt we eat comes from processed food as people have become accustomed to eating such “food” as the bulk of their diet. What’s the result? We’re all eating too much salt.

The focus on salt is yet another indication that we need to start cooking again. Changing our habits isn’t easy. But it can be done. The trick is to continue educating ourselves (reading books like Food Matters) and learning how to cook and appreciate home cooked food. Instead of watching Top Chef while eating take-out, spend that hour cooking a meal with your friends and create your own drama.

Image: Daniel Y. Go

A High-Fructose Corn Syrup Researcher Answers His Critics

grist — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 17:30:15 +0000

This is Part 1 of 2 posts of in-depth analysis into the breakthrough work on high-fructose corn syrup and weight gain by Princeton researchers.

I have to admit that I was fascinated to watch the fallout over the Princeton HFCS study. What I thought would generate a “oh, look, another great reason to avoid HFCS!” reaction swiftly turned into “that study doesn’t prove a thing!” – a sentiment that nutritionists, food business columnists and the Corn Refiners Association all, remarkably, shared.

Still, several questions raised by critics are worth addressing. We contacted the lead author of the Princeton study, Bart Hoebel, to see if he could shed some light on general questions surrounding the work as well as particular objections raised by physiologist Karen Teff, Ph.D, of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in a blog post by Nicci Micco on Eating Well‘s website.

The full email transcript appears below. One clarification in particular that I found interesting has to do with claims that the researchers didn’t directly compare HFCS consumption to table sugar consumption in a key experiment and thus are not able to conclude that HFCS causes more and worse weight gain over table sugar. In the experiment in question, researchers gave rats access to a 10% HFCS “drink” in addition to their normal feed. The rats gained excess weight in their abdomens (which is associated with metabolic disorders) and their triglyceride levels increased (also a symptom of metabolic disorders).

Dr. Hoebel points out that previous research has firmly established that if you give rats access to a 10% table sugar “drink” in addition to their normal feed, they do not gain additional fat. In other words, their bodies are able to metabolize the extra calories without creating more weight. This previous research is referenced in the study–but was apparently overlooked by critics. In other words, while the researchers didn’t compare HFCS to sugar directly in that particular experiment, we already know what happens to rats when you feed them small amounts of additional table sugar.

I understand that his answers to this and other criticisms won’t convince everyone, but I hope people will read the commentary below and think about just what level of “proof” we need before questioning the wisdom of making HFCS ubiquitous in our food system. For more thoughts on why the debate over HFCS has become so contentious, see Part 2 of this analysis.

The first two questions we had for Dr. Hoebel came from Grist Food Editor Tom Philpott:

Q: Do you have any particular comments on the issue of “statistical significance”? Is it true that the results in experiments 1 and 3 both lacked statistical significance, as some have claimed?

Hoebel: No, this is not true as a general statement. We reported results that are statistically significant as stated in the article. In Experiment 1, rats with 12-or 24-hour access to HFCS gained significantly more weight than the group with 12-hour access to sucrose. In Experiment 3, the main finding is that females rats with 24-hour access to HFCS weighed the most after 7 months , and this was overall (Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance) statistically different than the sucrose and chow fed controls.

This is important and meaningful because the 24-hour HFCS females had significantly heavier fat pads in the abdominal and uterine areas. They also had higher blood triglyceride levels than the other groups, which may have contributed to the body weight and body fat.

Q: Why did “Experiment 2″ in your study, which compared rats’ access to HFCS over 12 and 24 hour time periods, not include sucrose? What are the clearest conclusions that can be drawn from its results as constructed? [Note to reader: this question is also addressed above--the bit about access to table sugar solution not seeming to show weight gain in rats.]

Hoebel: The goal of this paper was not exclusively to compare HFCS to sucrose. Rather, we were interested in assessing 1) limited vs. continuous access to HFCS, as our previous research has focused on binge eating of sugars, 2) differences in body weight gain as a results of access to HFCS that might result in males vs. females, and 3) the effects of long term access to HFCS on parameters such as triglyceride levels and fat accrual.

The vision of the paper was to study the effects of HFCS on body weight and obesity, not just to pit it against sucrose. The clearest conclusions that can be drawn from Experiment 2 are that, in male rats, long term consumption of HFCS increases triglyceride levels and fat accrual. To us, this is an important finding. It shows that not only will HFCS increase body fat, but it will also increase these obesogenic parameters

Next, we asked Dr. Hoebel to respond to criticisms of his work leveled by Dr. Karen Teff of the Monell Chemical Senses Center:

Comment #1: The solutions of HFCS and sucrose used in all the studies-there were a few-in the Princeton report provided different levels of calories. (The HFCS, in fact, was lower in calories.)

Hoebel: It is true that the solutions of HFCS and sucrose were not offered as calorically equivalent. We note this in the Methods section of the paper. However, it is important to note that the HFCS consuming rats in Experiment 1, the short-term (2-month) study, showed greater gains in body weight while taking in fewer calories of sugar compared to the groups consuming sucrose. This led us to hypothesize that there might be something different about the way HFCS affects the body. Thus, we conducted Experiment 2, the long-term (6 month) study, and measurements showed that increased triglyceride levels and increased body fat were seen in the rats will access to HCFS, but not sucrose.

Comment #2: In one of the studies, the authors reported that male rats had a higher body weight after being exposed to 12 hours of access to the HFCS plus their typical rat chow compared to 1) standard chow alone, 2) 12 hours of access to sucrose with chow, and 3) 24 hours of access to sucrose with chow. However, they did not report or do the statistics on the change in weight. Thus, this is meaningless and poorly controlled.

Hoebel: One of the groups listed above is cited incorrectly; group 3 had 24 hours of HFCS and chow access (no sucrose access). As stated in the Methods section, the males in the three groups of Experiment 1 were “weight-matched”. That means the average (mean) weight of the rats in each group started out the same. Therefore the end-point body weights reported are in fact accurate representations of the mean body weight change. Ergo, the statistics were done on the appropriate measure. The result is meaningful and well controlled, given the use of not one but three comparison groups.

Comment #3: In a second experiment, they compared chow to chow-plus-HFCS for 24 hours and chow-plus-HFCS for 12 hours and found that access to the HFCS increased body weight. So what? Again, meaningless. This is like taking two groups of people, giving them the same diet but allowing one group to drink sweetened soda whenever they liked. Of course, they will gain weight because they are ingesting more calories. These findings have nothing to do with the controversy between sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup.

Hoebel: The result is, in fact, meaningful. As cited in the Discussion section, we have previously shown that the rats are able to compensate for the excess calories obtained when drinking 10% sucrose by taking fewer calories of chow and thereby maintaining a normal body weight. Therefore, we thought it was interesting and important to report that long-term access to HFCS causes rats to become overweight, whereas access to 10% sucrose does not. While comparisons were made to sucrose in some of the studies, this was not the sole focus of the paper. Rather, we were interested in seeing the effects of HFCS on body weight and obesogenic characteristics, and there were other variables of interest that were studied (as described in the response to the next comment).

Comment #4: Finally, in a third study, they show body weight as a percent of baseline (this is appropriate) and show that rats who had free access to both chow and HFCS gained a tiny bit more weight than chow alone, 12 hours of HFCS or 12 hours of sucrose. They did not compare it to the control of 24 hours of access to sucrose.

Hoebel: The statistical test (Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance) did show an overall significant difference between female rats with HFCS to drink 24-hr per day and the groups with chow alone or 12-hr access to sucrose, as described in the Results section. We did not compare 24-hr HFCS vs. 24-hr sucrose in this study because 1) in our previous studies (with both male and female rats) we have noted that rats with 24-hr access to 10% sucrose do not gain significantly more weight than chow-fed controls, and 2) in addition to comparing HFCS to sucrose, we were interested in the effects of limited (12-h) access to HFCS to see if it would cause binging that might enhance HFCS intake or body weight. Further, we chose to focus on assessing 12-h access as a variable because we did not know the effect of 12-hr vs. 24-hr HFCS access in female rats. This was of interest to us in light of the findings in Experiment 1 in males where we made that comparison, and because our laboratory has a long-standing interest in the effects of binge eating of palatable food. We explain and give the rationale for the choice of these variables in the Methods section.

So yes, the females drinking 24-hr HFCS showed a statistically significant increase in body weight. It is important and meaningful because these females had significantly heavier fat pads in the abdominal and uterine areas. They also had higher blood triglyceride levels than the other groups, which may have contributed to the body weight and body fat characteristics of obesity.

Our study in laboratory rats complements the growing body of literature suggesting that HFCS affects body weight and some obesogenic parameters. We cite in our paper additional evidence reported by other groups that supports our findings, and also acknowledge studies that suggest that HFCS does not affect body weight in ways different than that of sucrose. We acknowledge in the paper that at higher concentrations (e.g. 32%) sucrose has been shown to increase body weight. We are claiming, however, that at the concentrations we compared in this study, HFCS causes characteristics of obesity. The data show that both male and female rats are (1) overweight, (2) have heavier fat pads, particularly in the abdominal area and (3) have elevated circulating triglyceride levels.

For more information and references on this topic, as studied in both animals and humans, see a review published this year by George Bray, Curr Opin Lipidol. 2010 Feb; 21(1):51-7. “Soft drink consumption and obesity: it is all about fructose”.

Editor’s note: Article by Tom Laskawy. Originally published by our friends at Grist.org. Grist is a media organization that has been dishing out environmental news and commentary with a humorous twist since 1999. Be sure to visit them and say hi, and follow Grist on Twitter, too!

Image: JonathanCohen

Not Soy Fast

Vanessa Barrington — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 12:00:22 +0000

Soy: It’s everywhere. It’s eaten in copious amounts by bodybuilders, as a meat substitute by vegans and vegetarians, and unwittingly in a wide variety of processed foods by most people.

We’ve been told that soy is good for us and the fact of lower incidences of cancer and heart disease in Asian populations is cited as proof. The truth is there is no historical precedent for the amount of soy we consume in modern processed foods. Though soy did originate in Asia, it is used sparingly in Asian cuisines and more often in its traditional forms, like miso, tofu, natto, and tempeh.

According to the United Soybean Board’s own website, soy protein (processed soy) serves as a functional ingredient in the following foods and for the following applications:

Baked Goods – used to hold moisture, extend shelf life, improve texture and mouthfeel, and improve manufacturing, handling, and machine ability.

Breakfast Cereals – used to boost protein value and quantity.

Pasta – to boost nutritive value, especially in school lunches.

Beverages and Toppings – to whiten coffee creamers, emulsify, provide texture, and add protein content.

Meat, Poultry and Fish Products – to enhance moisture holding, texture, cohesion, yield, shelf life, and nutrition.

Dairy-Type Products (scary in itself) – soy protein lowers cost, improves nutrition and reduces allergenic response.

Here’s a quote from the Soybean Board website: “Processed and whole meat products can be improved by adding soy protein, which provides the product flexibility and cost stability consumers demand.”

Now, from the list of uses above and this quote, it looks to me like soy protein is a mighty functional food for the food processing industry. How did so many consumers become convinced that soy protein is a functional food for them?

Nearly 60 percent of the foods sold in supermarkets and natural food stores contain soy. Much of this is disguised in cookies, crackers, burgers and other meat products. It’s also a main ingredient in protein bars, meat substitutes, and any number of other foods.

Why is the food industry putting soy in everything?

If we look at how soy protein is made, it might give you some idea.

After soy vegetable oil is made, there is a lot of soybean meal left over. This defatted soybean meal is mixed with an alkaline solution to remove the fiber, and then washed in an acid solution to separate out the protein. The protein curds are then dipped into another alkaline solution and spray-dried at extremely high temperatures. Then it is spun into protein fibers using textile industry technology.

The food industry has figured out a way to utilize a highly processed industrial byproduct by putting it in food to extend shelf life, yield, and nutritional content. And then they’ve funded a lot of studies and spent a lot of advertising dollars to convince us that this substance is good for us.

You’ve seen some of the conflicting research (summarized below). You’ll have to decide for yourself which studies you believe and what dietary decisions are right for you.

Personally, I’m sticking to real food as close to its natural state as possible and avoiding processed foods of all types. And when I eat soy, it will be in small quantities in its traditional forms. Check back on Friday for a recipe using tempeh, a fermented soy product that originated in Indonesia.

Here is a brief summary of the claims made on either side of the bean pod along with some links to help you do your own research. The truth usually lies somewhere in between.

The “Soy is good!” camp: Soy contains isoflavones that prevent cancer, heart disease, osteoporosis and more. Soy’s phytochemicals protect against heart disease. Men who drink two servings of soymilk every day are 70% less likely to develop prostate cancer. Soy is a low fat form of protein. Soy lowers bad cholesterol. Soy prevents breast cancer. Soy builds strong bones.

The “Soy is bad!” camp: Soy doesn’t lower cholesterol as much as we first thought. The estrogens in soy can lead to breast cancer. Soy can decrease sperm count and libido. Soy can prevent ovulation. Soy can cause thyroid problems, constipation and other digestive problems. Soy is a common food allergy.